http://www.sptimes.com/2007/09/01/Hillsborough/For_pastors__divorce_.shtml
For pastors, divorce's stain fades
Hours after the Revs. Randy and Paula White announced their
impending divorce last week, Christians began discussing how the
evangelical power couple had come undone.
It had, in fact, been a tough week for televangelist couples.
The day before the White's revelation, Atlanta Bishop Thomas W.
Weeks III alledgedly assaulted his estranged wife, evangelist
Juanita Bynum, in a hotel parking lot. The couple had met to
discuss reconciliation. But it turned violent when Weeks choked,
kicked and threatened to kill his wife, police said.
Both couples' histrionics - the Whites made their announcement from
the pulpit of their Tampa church Aug. 23 - rocked the evangelical
world and left many tongues wagging about the state of clerical
marriage and the ability of divorced clerics to minister. In both
relationships, each of the ministers had been divorced
before.
"The clergy is supposed to be setting an example for the other lay
families," said Adair T. Lummis, a faculty associate at Hartford
Seminary in Connecticut. "It looks strange to people."
At Without Walls International Church, the Whites' megaministry,
Randy White told members that he expected some in the congregation
to leave because of their divorce. Indeed, a small exodus appears
to have begun. But plenty of the church's 22,000 members say they
will continue to support their pastors.
